The invention concerns a method, a computer and computer program modules with which data can be transferred between various components of a computer network. In particular, the invention concerns a method, a device system and computer program modules with which print data are be transferred between a plurality of devices, stored and retrieved.
In high-capacity printing systems, in variable print data and resources (forms, fonts etc.) are combined into what are known as print jobs and are transferred from a data source in a print production system. Such systems (which comprise computers, control units and print devices) are, for example, specified in the publication “Das Druckerbuch”, published by Dr. Gerd Goldmann (Océ Printing Systems GmbH), 6th edition (May 2001), ISBN 3-00-001019-x. In chapter 14, the server system Ocè PRISMApro is specified. This flexible print data server system is, for example, suited to convert print data from data sources (such as a source computer that provides print data in a specific print data language such as AFP (Advanced Function Presentation), PCL (Printer Command Language), PostScript, SPDS (Siemens Print Data Stream) or LCDS (Line Coded Data Stream)) and to transfer it to a print production system. The print data server system is thereby comprised of at least one master print server and possibly a few slave print servers. The print data can be read in by the master print server from various sources, if necessary converted, transmitted to the slave print servers, and from there transferred in parallel to a plurality of printers. Depending on the type of data and the involved components, different requirements with regard to the data throughput and the data preservation between the involved components exist for the overall data transmission. This requires a flexible method of data transmission that enables a transmission with high data throughput, if necessary ensuring the preservation of the data for a later access, can be applied across computer boundaries, and is easy to integrate into existing methods.